Wednesday, 01 February 2023 | PNS | DEHRADUN
City bus operators of Dehradun have expressed their discontentment at the recent decision of the Regional Transport Authority (RTA) to make the installation of vehicle location tracking devices (VLTDs) in all types of public transport vehicles mandatory.
The president of the Dehradun Mahanagar City Bus Seva Mahasangh, Vijay Vardhan Dandriyal said that city buses have route permits for specific routes and most of them operate up to 25 kilometres on daily basis. The city buses do not necessarily need this, he said. According to him, the State government has also given a rebate in taxes to the city bus operators considering their poor financial condition but the order of VLTD installation will increase the financial burden on bus operators. He said, “VLTD installation for each bus would cost about Rs 10,000 to Rs 12,000. Subsequently, the bus operators would need to spend about Rs 5,000 every year to recharge it. It is just an unnecessary and additional expense for the bus operators and we oppose it.” However, the Transport department officials clarified that installation of such devices has been made mandatory as per the orders of the Central government.
The RTA had made VLTD installation mandatory only in goods carriage vehicles last year but on Monday, the Garhwal commissioner and RTA head Sushil Kumar issued an order to make the VLTD installation mandatory in all kinds of public serving vehicles. The enforcement teams of transport offices would also start checking campaigns for all vehicles from the second week of February to ensure compliance of the order, as per the officials.
